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It’s almost here!!!!!! I am SO SO SO excited for Time Lord Fest this year!!!

Why should you go to Time Lord Fest? Let me tell you!

The Cosplays! – You are going to see some incredible costumes! Seriously, last year’s costumes were beyond Fantastic!

Dr. Geek’s Lab will be there! – If you have not heard this podcast you must be living under a rock of boringness! Check out the post I did about Dr. Geek’s Lab.

The Ken Spivey Band will be there. – If you haven’t heard them you are missing out!

The Panels – There are some incredible panels each year. Last year I really really enjoyed The Science of Doctor Who and the Cosplay advice panel.

The Fandom!!! – For an entire day you get to get off the island of Whovian loneliness and spend a day eating Jelly Babies and saying Allons-y! You don’t have to feel like the only Whovian around anymore! You will find there are plenty of others who love the show!

The Merchandise! – There are some really great gifts for yourself or a fellow Whovian to be found at Time Lord Fest. Some of it can be found online but many of the items I saw last year, I haven’t seen anywhere else!

The Fashion Show – You will have to work very very hard not to laugh the whole time. You see, Spivey has a bit of a sense of humor and likes to torment the models with his description of them. Be ready for that!

There’s a T.A.R.D.I.S. – Last year there was a full sized T.A.R.D/I.S. I don’t really think further explanation is needed.

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We had so much fun learning the Letter I this week as part of our letter a week lessons. I hope you are ready for a treat!

I is for Insect.

We studied insects first. We read The Very Hungry Caterpillar for this and really enjoyed it. I know there is some debate about whether a caterpillar is an insect but either way, a butterfly is so we went ahead. After we read The Very Hungry Caterpillar we went on an insect hunt in the back yard. We found many butterflies and C had a ton of fun chasing them around the yard.

I is for Inuit

We learned a bit about the Inuit culture and the Inuits as a people. They are an eskimo people that live in Alaska and Canada. We also read the book Mama, Do You Love Me? which shares a lot of fun things about their way of life. We played a fun game of Mama would you love me if? C was able to ask, “Would you love me if I..” questions and answered them honestly in the same way that the book does. You can read more about inuits here. I is for Ice We had a fun little experiment where we put ice on a black piece of paper and a white piece of paper. We then put them in the sun to see which would melt first.

Spoonful.com has a great recipe that I followed.What you will need

Ice cubes I used about 1 tray.

1 cup half and half

1/2 cup salt – I used Morton Ice Cream Salt

2 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 pint-size ziplock bag

1 gallon-size ziplock bag

Chocolate chips! – You don’t have to but they are so yummy with this!

What you will do:

You will mix vanilla, sugar, and half & half in the smaller pint sized bag.

Pour your salt in your larger bag with the ice.

Seal your smaller bag well and put it inside your larger bag.

Close the larger bag.

Shake like crazy! – Seriously, your child will be shaking this bag for a little bit so get them going.

You can check your ice cream for consistency and when it is the way you want it you can add in your chocolate chips.

Serve with a spoon or pour into a bowl and enjoy!

C shook his bag so hard it blurred when I shot the pic!

What are you doing this week to learn the letter I? I would love to hear!

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For some of you this post will sound trivial. Humor me. After a long day I love to sit down with my husband and watch a great show. However, I didn’t like the bill I kept getting every month for this luxury. I decided it was time to research ways to kick the cable! After all, why am I paying for tons of channels I just won’t watch? I am going to share with you some of the things I found and my personal favorite to help you ditch the cable.

I will tell you about the products first and then the great ways to stream!

Antenna

You can use an antenna to get local channels. Please keep in mind that if you have an HDTV you will need a converter box for most of these to work. Antennas like the one pictured can start as low as 9.98. However, the converter boxes start at around $40 and work their way up quickly.

Systems such as the Sony Playstation 3, Nintendo Wii, and Xbox 360 can stream wirelessly with some programs. However, the Xbox 360 requires an Xbox Gold membership which runs about $59 a year in order to work. Systems like these start as low as $149 and go up from there.Roku

The Roku 2 XD Streaming Player 1080p is what we went with. It costs $58 on sale right now. You can get Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, and countless others. There are 750 channels right now and they are always addnig more! There are MANY free channels you can watch. Some of these include an entire PBS channel where your child can watch great educational shows for free and a full MLB sports channel for the man in your life. R is very excited about the cooking with kids channel that offers countless recipes to make with kids. It was so easy to set up too! All you need is wireless internet and you are good to go!Streaming Options

Amazon Prime – Amazon Prime is $99 for the year. You will get many movies and shows streamed to your device. This breaks down to $8.25 a month. Even better, you also get free 2 day shipping on all prime items from Amazon!

Netflix – You can try Netflix for free for the first month. Netflix is a great way to stream many movies and tv shows. I can tell you they have almost all of the Doctor Who episodes as well as a ton of educational and kids programming! After your free trial you will pay $7.99 a month.

Hulu – With Hulu you will get your first week free. After than you will pay $7.99 a month. You can watch most TV shows the day after they air on TV. While you will wait a day for some shows, think of how much sits in your DVR waiting it’s turn. You can do it! You can wait a day. After a short time you won’t know the difference.

What did you pick?

I went with the Roku. Here is my price breakdown.

Cable price before cancelling – $60 a month or $720 a year!!!

What I purchased:

Amazon Prime – $79 for the year or $6.59 a month

Netflix – $7.99 a month

Hulu – $7.99 a month

Roku – $58 one time purchaseThat comes out to $328.76 for the year.

If you break down monthly payments taking out the fact that prime is paid annually and you now own your Roku you will pay only $16 a month for a lot more programming than you previously had and the control to decide what you really want to watch.

Even with purchasing the Roku I have saved $391.24 a year!

Now imagine what my budget will look like each year without that fine included.

If I have forgotten an option you think is a must have please leave me a comment. I would be glad to check it out and add it if it works great!